This
file holds archives of new developments during 2001. Other archives
hold material from 1999 and 2000.
New Developments contains the most recent
materials. For a broad overview of the scientific trends since OSF
was published, see Broad
Trends. And for pointers to a host of important new research
results, organized by topic, visit Recent
Important Studies.

28
December 2001. In a study published in the end of last year, German
scientists report extremely low levels of bisphenol A and octylphenol
create superfemale snails in two different species. The superfemales
had excessive egg and spawning mass production and
distorted sex organs. Males of one species also had smaller penises.
More...

22
December 2001. Three recently published studies using laboratory
animals of the low dose effects of bisphenol A (BPA) reinforce
public health concerns about the possible impacts of this ubiquitous
plastic compound. In one, Dr. Caroline Markey and colleagues describe
effects on mammary gland tissue in adult mice after exposure
in the womb that raises plausible questions about BPA involvement
in stimulation of breast cancer. In a second, Jorge Ramos et
al. report on impacts
that low level BPA exposure has on adult prostate, the details
of which resemble processes involved
in human prostate cancer. And the third, by a scientific team from
Japan led by Dr. Motoharu Sakaue, demonstrates that BPA
suppresses sperm count in adult mice. Added to already disturbing
information about BPA impacts, these new studies highlight the need
for an urgent reconsideration by FDA and EPA of the need for better
protections for people from BPA exposure. For
background on BPA...

12
December 2001. Environmental
Science and Technology summarizes findings by Dr. Tyrone
Hayes, U.C. Berkeley, indicating that atrazine, the most abundantly
used herbicide in the world, causes reproductivedamage
to frogs at 0.1 parts per billion, levels far beneath standards
for drinking water in the U.S. and even beneath concentrations
found in rain water. Hayes presented these results at the annual
meeting of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry,
in Baltimore. Approximately 20% of males of the species Xenopus
laevus (the African clawed toad) exposed to atrazine at 0.1
ppb develop multiple mixed gonads. Normal males have two testes.
Exposed males, in contrast can have several testes and several ovaries.
At 1 ppb, Hayes also sees reductions in the size of the vocal chord.
At scientific meetings in Japan on 17 December, Hayes reported that
field investigations of the leopard frog Rana pipiens, a
species native to much of North America, reveal eggs in the frogs'
testes in regions where atrazine is applied, but not where atrazine
is not used. He is currently simulating field conditions in the
laboratory to determine whether atrazine can produce the same phenomenon.
These findings may play a crucial role in EPA's ongoing assessment
of atrazine risk. They would suggest that atrazine has adverse ecological
effects at levels currently allowed in US drinking water. Moreover,
the hormonal mechanism that appears to cause the frog effects
aromatase conversion of testosterone to estrogenis common
to all vertebrates, including human. According to Hayes, some of
the commercial sources for Xenopus (the "lab rat"
of frogs) are unwittingly raising Xenopus in atrazine-contaminated
water. This means that generations of experiments on the endocrinology
of amphibians may have been using contaminated animals and could
thereby have produced false negatives in toxicological experiments.
More on all this when Hayes's research is published in the peer-reviewed
literature.

5
December 2001. The New
York Times and Washington
Post both report that EPA's Christie Todd Whitman has
decided to reject GE's efforts to avoid its cleanup responsibilities
in the Hudson River. Whitman had announced
in early August that GE's PCB spills in the Hudson River would
be dredged, and that GE would be required to pay almost $500M for
the cleanup. That decision was followed by fierce, inside lobbying
by GE to either reverse the decision or weaken it by requiring unattainable
performance standards that could then be used to halt dredging.
The final decision calls for removing 2.65
million cubic yards of contaminated sediment 40 miles of the Hudson.

26
November 2001. Betty
Hileman reports in Chemical and Engineering News on what
public health scientists are calling an epidemic of pre-term birth
in the United States. Since the mid-1980s, the percentage of
babies born prematurely has increased by 23%. Premature birth
is linked to a greater risk of infant mortality, neurocognitive
disorders, anemia, jaundice, cerebral palsy and other dysfunctions.
The causes of the increased frequency of pre-term birth are unknown,
but as reported by Hileman, exposure to environmental chemicals
may be contributing. One of the problems in finding the causes is
that animal research on chemical exposure rarely examines gestation
length as a health endpoint. Research
earlier in the year by the US CDC revealed that the risk of
premature birth was associated with DDT exposure.

12
October 2001. Dianne Dumanoski speaks to the GEA Conference in Tokyo
Japan: "The
next century stretches ahead of us like an urgent question. The
problem isn't simply that we don't have the answer. Our actions
suggest the leaders of our now global civilization don't fully grasp
the dilemma confronting us. We might get a better fix on our dilemma
and target our efforts more effectively if we understood this as
a "humanity
crisis" rather than an environmental crisis. Whatever else
is in jeopardy,this is first and foremost a crisis for
humans and our current civilization. ...By now it should be
clear that we must stop chasing brush fires and take on the pyromaniac.

15
September 2001. Scientists from Tulane University report in Nature
that several EDCs can interfere with the chemical signaling from
plant to bacteria that initiates the symbiotic relationship crucial
for nitrogen fixation, an ecological process vital to life on earth.
By binding with a bacterial receptor that normally receives the
plant signals, these contaminants prevent
activation of the bacterial gene that initiates formation of the
nodules where nitrogen fixation takes place. More...

15
August 2001. In Tokyo, The Japanese newspaper Asahi
Shimbun reports that research by three separate scientific institutions
studying three different species have discovered feminization
of fish living in marine waters around Japan.
This surprised the scientists because they had expected the dilution
effection of marine waters to be sufficient to negate any inputs
of endocrine disrupting compounds. The fact that at least three
species are involved means it is likely to be widespread. The research
indicates that "the prevalence of the feminized fish is greater
in waters near urban areas that produce large amounts of industrial
and household waste water." Research in Japan has not clarified
which contaminants are responsible for the feminization.
More on fish feminization...

15
August 2001. Legal star Johnny Cochrane visited Anniston,
Alabama, yesterday to meet with residents about legal options in
their fight against decades of massive PCB, mercury and lead
pollution by Monsanto and other companies. As described in a
story
in the Anniston Star by reporter Elizabeth Bluemink, over 5000
people came to hear Cochrane speak to the community, and "more
than 13,000 Anniston residents have already filled
out health surveys that are under review by Cochran's legal team."
According to observers of the meeting, "At one point Cochran
likened the community's struggle to the civil rights movement, and
called upon everyone present to summon the same kind of courage
and fortitude that characterized Rosa Parks' stand against discrimination
decades ago."More about Monsanto's contamination of Anniston
in the Chemical Industry Archives...

13
August 2001. In a study published in the July issue of Environmental
Health Perspectives, scientists report that some styrene
compounds leaching out of food containers are estrogenic. They
used two assays to assess estrogenicity: cell proliferation in a
line of human breast cancer cells and binding
affinity to the human estrogen receptor. More...

12
August 2001. PFOS--perfluorooctane sulfonate--has emerged
as a new type of persistent, organic pollutant that binds to proteins
rather than accumulating in fatty tissues. The widespread nature
of PFOS contamination was missed for a long time, even though the
compound has been in commercial use (in products like 3M's Scotchgard)
since the 1950s.New studies are documenting PFOS contamination in
many living organisms around the world, including people, polar
bears and bald eagles. More...

12
August 2001. We've updated the list of chemicals implicated
as endocrine disrupting compounds, and included more information
about their mechanisms of action as well
as references. We're also interested in receiving pointers from
site visitors about emerging data on other chemicals. More...

5
August 2001. The Anchorage
Daily News reports that contamination levels of a killer
whale that died in Prince William Sound were extremely high.
The whale, which died in July 2000 and whose tissue was assayed
by National Marine Fisheries Service's contaminants lab in Seattle,
carried PCB concentrations of 370 parts per million and about
470 parts per million DDT. The group to which the Orca
belonged has decreased by over 50% in the last 12 years.The contamination
is likely to have contributed to the animal's death but this is
not known for certain. More
on Orca contamination...

4
August 2001. Describing new research sponsored by the Japanese Environment
Agency, the Japan Times reports that nonylphenol induces formation
of eggs in the testes of fish exposed
to very low levels of nonylphenol. Nonylphenol was detected
in over one-third of Japanese rivers and streams surveyed by the
Ministry, and at 71 of the 1574 sites surveyed the concentrations
exceeded levels sufficient to disrupt sexual development based on
this new research. The Ministry is in consultation with industry
about possible substitutes for nonylphenol to reduce environmental
burdens. According to the Japan Times, Japan's leading researcher
on endocrine disruption, Dr. Taisen Iguchi, called for swift movement
to eliminate nonylphenol discharges into the environment. More...

2
August 2001. The
New York Times editorializes that EPA Administrator Whitman
deserves credit for saving the Bush Administration from another
"catastrophe on the environment" with her decision to
force GE to pay for cleaning up the Hudson River. The
Times urges GE to accept the decision and become a constructive
player in river clean-up.

1
August 2001. Bush
vs. Big Business? You Never Know. Time Magazine.
Whitman's decision supporting the Clinton plan to force GE to dredge
its PCB wastes from the Hudson River appears to be part of a Bush
administration effort to appear as if it is willing, occasionally,
to stiff its corporate supporters. The devil is in the details.
In this case, the one substantive change made by Whitman in the
dredging plan is to proceed by stages, testing each step of the
way to ensure its proceeding asplanned without adverse effects.
Time suggests that Republican pollsters
will be in there testing, too, and that the Administration is
likely to back off aggressive implementation of this clean-up as
soon as polls indicate they can get away with it.

1
August 2001. The New
York Times reports that US EPA Administrator Christie Todd
Whitman has decided to approve the Clinton Administration's plan
to force GE to pay to clean up PCB contamination in the Hudson
River. The total cost to GE will be almost $500 million. The
clean up will take place in stages, with testing undertaken during
the process to ensure that contamination does not spread. GE shareholders
should voice their support for this decision and encourage the incoming
Chairman Jeffrey Immelt to put Jack
Welch's legacy behind them and support the EPA ruling. GE's reputation
can only be tarnished and shareholder value decreased by further
stonewalling. Washington
Post coverage

28
July 2001. The Japan
Times reports that a Japanese health ministry panel has decided
to restrict the use of certain phthalates in pacifiers and other
plastic objects that infants might put in their mouths. According
to the Times, the Pharmaceutical Affairs and Food Sanitation Council
"recommends that restrictions be placed on two kinds of
phthalate ester -- diisononyl phthalate and diethylhexyl phthalate
(DEHP). The panel also recommended a ban on the use of DEHP in the
manufacture of plastic gloves and plastic wrap used in the processing,
cooking and preservation of food with oil and fat. Large
amounts of DEHP had been found in Japan last year in store boxed
lunches; the source was thought to be contact with plastic gloves
during food preparation.

28
July 2001. According to the New
York Times, Governor George Pataki has voiced support
for the EPA's plan to require GE to pay for dredging PCB wastes
it dumped into the Hudson River. Quoted in the Times, Pataki said
"science supports what the E.P.A. and the state's own Department
of Environmental Conservation have already determined."
Pataki's position is crucial because he is a moderate Republican
and because of George W. Bush's professed wish to delegate responsibilities
for environmental protection back to the states. If Bush is going
to be consistent in his policies, then Pataki's position should
trump GE's campaign contributions to Bush. Bush's earlier
statements about PCBs and the Stockholm Convention on Persistent
Organic Pollutants would also be consistent with dredging.But since when did policy consistency trump campaign contributions?
More...

27
July 2001. The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
has signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the chemical industry
trade association, American Chemistry Council, "to improve
testing chemicals for potential human developmental and reproductive
effects," according to a NIEHS press release dated 26 July.
ACC is providing $1 million and the
NIEHS $3 million to a fund for research on testing chemicals for
developmental and reproductive effects. This agreement undermines
the independence and integrity of NIEHS science. More...

27
July 2001. The Washington
Post and the Los
Angeles Times both carried prominent stories on the efforts
by GE to fight EPA's draft decision that would require GE to pay
for dredging the Hudson River of PCBs it dumped there prior to 1977.
Gov. George Pataki and both New York Senators, Schumer and Clinton,
are strong and vocal supporters of the EPA draft plan. Why is
GE fighting this when the costs would be about 5 days of its annual
profits?It probably has to
do with the fact that GE is simultaneously involved in negotiations
at 87 Superfund sites around the country. The precedent set in the
Hudson will have huge national ramfications. GE may ultimately
suffer the consequences for having been one of the largest polluters
in the world for the last 4 decades.

26
July 2001. A New
York Times editorial argues that EPA Administrator Christie
Todd Whitman should not retreat from EPA's decision to force
GE to clean up its PCB mess in the Hudson River:. "As President
Bush's chief environmental officer, Christie Whitman has absorbed
plenty of abuse for the administration's generally deplorable environmental
record. Some of this criticism has been unfair, and in many cases
she has taken the fall for policies dictated by others. But Mrs.
Whitman will have only herself to blame if she chooses to scale
back the Clinton administration's plan
that would require General Electric to spend a half-billion dollars
to begin the long-overdue task of cleaning the upper Hudson River
of toxic chemicals known as PCB's."

25
July 2001. In research published in the April issue of Toxicological
Sciences, scientists in England report that even weakly estrogenic
contaminants in mixtures can affect the outcome of estrogenic assays
in the presence of 17ß-estradiol. This is important because
one of the arguments used to defuse concerns about endocrine disruption
is that native human estrogens, specifically 17ß-estradiol,
are too powerful compared to contaminants for the contaminants to
have an impact. This research makes that criticism scientifically
indefensible. More...

22
July 2001. India's national newspaper, The
Hindu reports on a scandal in the Indian state of Kerala: "the
cashew plantations in Kasargod district, Kerala, have been devastated
by an unusually large number of cancer deaths, neurological disorders
and different kinds of physical and mental impairment. Recent
reports in the media and studies done in the area indicate a strong
link between the spraying of a pesticide called endosulfan
and the deteriorating health of the local people. The State administration
appears to be oblivious to the situation." A local physician
first attempted to bring this to the attention of medical authorities
in 1997, reporting an unusually large number of people suffering
from diseases of the central nervous system and soliciting the intervention
of medical researchers in the baffling problem. The Hindu Times
reports that n a local random survey, he recorded 202 cases of people
from about 400 houses in an area of four square kilometres with
psychiatric problems, mental retardation, epilepsy, congenital anomalies,
cancer deaths, suicides as well as those currently suffering from
cancer. In a second story, The
Hindu wrote about "a people's movement in Kasargod district
to end the spraying." A local NGO, the Thanal Conservation
Action and Information Network, played an important role in drawing
attention to the poisonings.

21
July 2001. A paper published in the June issue of Environmental
Health Perspectives reveals that dioxin affects behavior
in standard psychological tests with rat offspring following a single
exposure to the mother during pregnancy at extraordinarily low
levels. The study confirms the inadequacy
of traditional toxicology testing for setting standards to protect
human health. More...

19
July 2001. The Washington
Post reports on a new study in Nature, documenting a
rising burden of Teflon-related chemicals in the environment. The
breakdown products of Teflon are extremely persistent and bioaccumulative.

19
July 2001. In an op-ed
in the New York Times, former US EPA General Counsel Gary Guzy
summarizes why the Bush Administration shouldsupport EPA's decision to clean up the Hudson River with
a $500M dredging program paid for by GE, the river's polluter.

18
July 2001. Writing in Nature, Virginia scientists report
that brominated diphenyl ethers, some of which are powerful thyroid
disruptors, can be found at high contamination
levels in sewage sludge applied as fertilizers to US cropland.
They also found the same contaminants in Virginia fish. More...

17
July 2001. A study in The Lancet strongly suggests that exposure
in the womb to DDE may cause premature birth and small size at birth
(controlling for gestational age). The study examined birth
records and contamination data gathered between 1959 and
1966 in urban areas in the United States. Compared to other risk
factors associated with premature birth and small size at birth,
the apparent impact of DDE was quite large. While DDE levels
have now dropped below these levels in the US , this study raises
serious questions for countries where DDT continues to be used for
vector control because of the link between premature birth and infant
mortality. More...

17
July 2001. A study published in 2000 reveals a strong statistical
association between undescended testes in young boys and levels
of two organochlorine contaminants in their fat tissue, HCE
and HCB. More
on the study...The results are consistent
with emerging molecular data on causes of cryptorchidism. Estrogenic
substances interfere with expression of genes crucial to normal
testicular descent. More
on the causes...

17
July. The
Las Vegas Sun editorializes against using human guinea
pigs to test the toxicity of perchlorate, a rocket fuel contaminating
the water of millions of people in the US west and a known thyroid
disrupting chemical. The tests, sponsored by Lockheed Martin,
would be used to justify avoiding clean-up costs. The Sun
correctly concludes these tests are unethical. The editorial misses
the reality, however, that the tests are also scientifically
useless because the results they would produce would reveal
nothing about the most vulnerable sector of the population to perchlorate,
the developing fetus and young children.Lockheed Martin's strategy is to test the less vulnerable, adult
men, and then claim, on that basis, that there is no human risk.

16
July 2001. The Washington
Post reports on a US government investigation of scientific
panels convened to advise the EPA on a broad range of issues related
to toxicity testing and standards. These panels frequently include
scientists with close ties to the industries whose products are
being regulated. "The General Accounting Office report found
serious deficiencies in the EPA's procedures for preventing conflicts
of interest and ensuring a proper
balance of views among members of Science Advisory Board panels."
The result is that advice rendered by the panels is often biased
in favor of the regulated industries.

14
July 2001. The Sacramento
Bee reports on a new study by the Environmental Working
Group, analyzing drinking water contamination by perchlorate, a
thyroid disrupting chemical used in rocket fuel. "EPA officials
say the bulk of the estimated 20 million people affected by the
chemical live in Los Angeles, San Diego and other Southern California
cities that take some of their water from the Colorado River."
Read
EWG's report...

12
July 2001. Writing in the Detroit
News, Jeremy Pearce describes a 9-year study of Michigan
residents that ties PCBs in contaminated Lake Michigan fish to
memory loss and brain damage in adults who eat them.Heretofore,
the main focus on neurological impacts of PCBs from contaminated
fish has been on impacts
caused by exposure in the womb. This suggests serious health
affects on adult males.

12
July 2001. The New
York Times reports that high level PCB contamination remains
in an upstate New York neighborhood in West Glens Falls, NY, despite
two clean-up efforts, first in 1979 and then again in 1999. Several
hundred homes may be affected. Contamination
levels range up to 1,500 parts per million PCBs. Anything above
50 ppm is considered toxic waste. Local residents manifest many
health symptoms of PCB exposure. The neighborhood was contaminated
in the 1950s when workers at a GE plant would bring home old capacitors
to disassemble, extracting copper wire to sell and pouring the PCB-contaminated
oil on the ground.

11
July 2001. National
Public Radio reports that hundreds of people over a 20 year
period mayhave been affected by a PCB contamination in West Glens
Falls, NY. Plant workers reportedly took home capacitors and
other equipment laden with PCBs, disassembled them to resell their
parts (such as copper wire) and then poured PCB-contaminated oil
onto the ground. As a result, some homes in this residential
are contaminated at levels 500 times U.S. soil clean up standards.
Details
in a .pdf file at www.toxicstargeting.com

8
July 2001. Experimental results published this spring indicate that
standard assays used to assess estrogen toxicity with rats may
underestimate the potency of bisphenol A
in people, because rats are more efficient at converting BPA
to a non-estrogenic metabolite. More...

5
July 2001. Charlie Cray writes in Multinational
Monitor about the history of GE's contamination of the Hudson
River Valley with PCBs, and the corporation's
ongoing efforts to avoid payment for clean-up. "Attention to
GEs Hudson PCB mess could also bring out some additional skeletons
in GEs closet."

4
July 2001. The New
York Times opines in an editorial that Jack Welch and GE
should stop fighting against EPA's recommendation to dredge the
Hudson River and clean it of PCBs. "Mr. Welch, however,
does have a fine chance to burnish his legacy of decisive action.
He can end his company's long legal battle
against paying to dredge the Hudson River to remove polychlorinated
biphenyls, cancer-causing chemicals known as PCB's."

2
July 2001. Reuters
reports from a scientific meeting in Switzerland on a new infertility
syndrome in males, called the "Testicular Dysgenesis Syndrome,"
or TDS. According to Dr. Neils Skakkabæk, a Danish expert
on male infertility and a leading investigator of the impacts of
endocrine disruption on reproductive function in men, genetics or
environmental factors, or both, could
be causing a new syndrome whose symptoms include male infertility
and rising rates of testicular cancer.

29
June 2001. The US EPA announced the implementation of a program
for evaluating the health risks from exposure to 20 common chemicals,
involving voluntary participation by 36 chemical companies. While
it sounds good at first blush, the program is woefully inadequate
compared to the need, and is more likely to provide an excuse
for inaction than the information necessary to develop realistic
standards that protect children's health. More...

28
June 2001. Canada's Supreme Court ruled that municipalities
have the right to outlaw use of pesticides on lawns. The
decision was over a challenge by lawn-care companies in Quebec,
who claimed that a 1991 law implemented
by Hudson, Quebec (a suburb of Montreal) was wrong to block use
of chemicals that had been approved by federal and provincial authorities.
The decision will allow municipalities across the country to
implement similar laws. Reuters
coverage. Editorial
by Dr. David Suzuki.

23
June 2001. In an article in Environmental Health Perspectives,
scientists report that exposure to very low levels of a pesticide,
endosulfan, interferes with reproduction in a salamander,
the red spotted newt, by disrupting
development of glands that synthesize chemical signals used in communication
between males and females. More...

22
June 2001. A team of scientists from Tufts University in Boston
present data confirming low level effects of bisphenol A.
Their study is another example of the ability
of independent academic laboratories to detect bisphenol A effects
even as industry continues to report they find no impacts. More...

4
June 2001. The
New Jersey Star Ledger reports that EPA's Administrator
Christie Todd Whitman is in the middle of a political and regulatory
wrangle over whether or not to require GE
to pay for dredging PCB waste out of the Hudson River. See also
www.CleanUpGe.org.

1
June 2001. Research by scientists at the National Institute of Environmental
Health Sciences reveals that exposure of newborn mice to a plant
estrogen found naturally in soy, genistein, causes uterine cancer
later in life. This effect is comparable to the impact of DES
(diethylstilbestrol) on newborn mice and it is induced by
concentrations of genistein within the range of those found in infant
formula made from soy. More...

On
22 May in Stockholm Sweden, delegates from 127 countries formally
voted approval of the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic
Pollutants. After the vote, ministerial
representatives signed the agreement on behalf of their governments.
The Convention now returns to each government for ratification.
This process is expected to take up to 5 years. Once 50 nations
have ratified the Convention it will enter into force. More...

14
May. A report from a panel of experts convened by the National Toxicology
Program of the US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
confirms the existence of low-dose effects of endocrine disrupting
compounds "well below the "no effect" levels determined
by traditional testing." More...

19
April. George W. Bush announced his support for the UN Convention
on Persistent Organic Pollutants in a ceremony in the Rose Garden.
Bush was accompanied by Secretary of State Colin Powell and EPA
Administrator Christie Todd Whitman. Observers speculated that the
prominence given his announcement was due
to recent criticisms of the Administration's environmental policy
and concern about public opinion. New
York Times. Washington
Post.

11
April 2001. John Peterson Myers and Lisa Guide write in the
New Jersey Star Ledger about the dilemma George W. Bush faces
as he must decide whether or not to support EPA's draft decision
to dredge PCBs out of the Hudson River. Should he side with
two moderate Republican Governors both of whom support dredging
(and one of whom is now his EPA head)? Or should he bow to the political
pressures of GE?

31
March. The
Economistobserves that for the chemical industry to earn the public
trust, might require "admitting that some of the chemicals
deemed so essential to modern life might--just possibly--be slowly
poisoning us.It certainly
requires a better show than that put on by the industry's spokesman
on Mr Moyers's programme, who insisted that all chemicals are
safe and have been tested."

March
2000. Writing in Toxicology Letters, scientist Richard
M. Sharpe concludes "until the appropriate in vivo
studies are undertaken, the safety of hormonally-active environmental
chemicals, especially in mixtures, will continue to give cause
for concern as far as testicular development is concerned.
More...

28
March. A member of the California State Assembly has introduced
AB 498 targeting persistent, bioaccumulative toxins (PBTs).
The bill would charge the Secretary for Environmental Protection
to examine pollution prevention practices in procurement, property
design, construction, maintenance and demolition, materials
use, and waste management; and develop a statewide plan to eliminate
new PBTs for consideration by the Legislature by March 1, 2002.
More...

27
March. Two websites launched following the broadcasting of Trade
Secrets. The first is the 'official
website' for the documentary. It includes a wide range of
resources about the show, including background material and steps
you can take. It also includes a
Flash
animation of "To the ends of the Earth," Chapter
Six of Our Stolen Future. The second website by the Environmental
Working Group is a complete
archive of the documents on which Trade Secrets was
based. It turns out that the material covered in the documentary
is only the tip of the iceberg.

"Bill
Moyers' new PBS special has all the elements of a blood
feud, and Moyers takes a blood test to prove it.

He
was tested for 150 industrial chemicals, and when he learns
there are 84 of them running around in his bloodstream,
he goes for blood.

His
paper trail of "trade secrets" ends at the doorstep
of the chemical industry. And it is not a happy ending for
the big-name chemical producers."

24
March. Chemical industry attacks on Bill Moyers became public
during the week of 18 March in anticipation of the airing of Trade
Secrets on 26 March, on PBS nationwide. This investigative special
by Moyers reveals decades of corruption of science and politics
by companies, trade associations and PR firms defending the chemical
industry. The
attacks claim that Moyers' treatment is unfair because he did
not interview them for the report. Moyers
counters by stating that the show is all about what they did
and said, all written down in documents they never intended anyone
outside the industry to see, and that the report actually presents
an accurate portrayal of their positions, unfettered by the spin
they would use to attempt to obscure the damning nature of the documents.
Moreover, for 30 minutes on air immediately after the program, industry
representatives will have an unedited opportunity to respond to
the program. Washington
Post coverage

In
a speech at the National Press Club on 22 March, Moyers gave
additional details of the attacks that have attempted to dissuade
PBS from airing the show. He also describes a previous and far more
successful effort by chemical interests to suppress and falsely
discredit a 1993 Moyers production about pesticides and children's
health. Part of industry's effort in 1993 involved a PR firm's
brazen abuse of a pro bono client relationship with the American
Cancer Society, which led to ACS unwittingly assisting industry's
attack. [a
Real Audio streaming audio version of this speech available
at C-SPAN]

21
March. The CDC released a new report on exposure levels of 27 contaminants
in the blood and urine of Americans. While lead and cotinine exposures
are down dramatically over the past decade, changes that triumphs
for public for health and chemical exposure regulation, the
CDC notes troubling exposures to a suite of organophosphate pesticides
and some phthalates.
Washington
Post coverage. CDC
website.
Public reaction. Lycos
coverage on the web.

21
March. The
New York Times reports that the Bush Administration plans
to reject new, more protective arsenic standards that would
have lowered permissible contamination in drinking water by 80%,
from 50 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion. The old standard
had been implemented in 1942, the new one proposed by the Clinton
Administration. Ironically, this announcement comes shortly after
new research
revealed that arsenic is an endocrine disruptor with demonstrable
effects on gene expression at the level of the new proposed standard.
The Bush decision leaves the American public exposed without a protective
safety factor. In a recent study, the National Academy of Sciences
concluded that the old standard could easily result in a cancer
risk of 1 in 100. They claim the new standard is not justified
economically. According to the New York
Times, mining companies played a role in the Bush Administration
decision. They were also heavy contributors to the Bush campaign.

17
March. According to new research in Environmental Health Perspectives,
arsenic inteferes with glucocorticoid-receptor control of DNA transcription
at extremely low levels (10 ppb). This is far below the level of
arsenic needed to cause cell toxicity. Arsenic's endocrine disruption
may be provide important insight into links between low level chronic
exposure to arsenic and human disease, including cancer and diabetes.
More...

15
March. While there is an ongoing, spirited debate
about whether American girls are reaching puberty earlier, and if
so, what is causing it, there is no question but that the rate
of sexual development in animals is vulnerable to contamination
in the womb. Humans, moreover, receive widespread exposure to
these very same contaminants. More...

14
March. According to a story
in the Japan Times, the Japanese Environment Ministry has added
four substances to their priority list of chemicals under study
as endocrine disruptors. The new compounds are butyl benzyl phthalate,
diethyl phthalate, diethylexyl phthalate and triphenyl tin.

8
March. According to a study published in the March 2001 issue of
Epidemiology, the risk of congenital birth defects leading
to fetal death is increased if the mother is living within a 9 square
mile area within which agricultural pesticides are being used. The
largest risks are found when exposure takes place during weeks 3-8
of the pregnancy. Exposures to multiple types of pesticides increased
the risk further.More...

6
March. According to the London Independent, Environment Minister
Michael Meacher said "he would press his European Union counterparts
to take international action on chemicals with dangerous side-effects,
which include commonly used pesticides, solvents and flame retardants."
According to the Independent, "the chemicals under review include
flame retardants
used in sofa fabrics that contain hormone-disrupting chemicals and
phthalates,
which are used as a solvent in many cosmetics and could affect humans.
Alkyltin, an antibacterial agent used in shoe insoles, can be absorbed
through the skin and has been shown to be a powerful hormone disrupter
in wildlife 
it has made female dog whelks grow penises." More...

5
March 2001. In response to requests, we have posted short summaries
of the fourteen chapters of Our Stolen Future on the web
and included excerpts from each of them.More...

3
March and 20 February 2001. In two articles examining the rate of
sexual development in American girls, the NYT's Gina Kolata reports
that doubts exist in medical community about whether, indeed, girls
are maturing earlier and if so, what to do about it.More...

16
February 2001. New research on tadpoles of the North American gray
treefrog reveals an unexpected interaction between a common
pesticide, carbaryl, and stress induced in the tadpoles by
predators. Without the predator-induced stress, short-term
exposure to low levels of carbaryl had no effect on survival. Longer
exposure increased mortality. By far the highest mortality, however,
was caused by exposure to carbaryl while in the presence of a predator.
Up to 97% of tadpoles died under these conditions. [The experiments
were conducted in a way that the tadpoles could sense the predator's
presence but the predator could not reach them.] These results
indicate that frogs are far more sensitive to pesticides in real-world
conditions than traditional toxicity testing will ever reveal.More...

16
February 2001. In a story
in the Los Angeles Times, Marla Cone describes the contamination
plight of Orcas (killer whales) living in the Puget Sound off the
coast of Washington and British Columbia. Interviewed in the Times,
marine mammal contamination expert Peter Ross reports these are
worst PCB levels ever seen in still-living marine mammals. Comparable
PCB contamination in other marine mammals, including seals and dolphins,
has led to severe suppression of the immune system, making them
vulnerable to viruses and other diseases. Ross's research "has
shown that male killer whales contain as much as 15 times more contamination
than the seals that suffered suppressed immunity." LA Times
reporter Cone cites Ross as saying that disruption of the whales'
immune systems and reproduction is likely, since there is no reason
to believe that PCBs' effects on whales are different from effects
on seals. And the Puget Sound Orcas the death rate of these Orca
has been climbing over the past 5 years.More on immune suppression...More on Orca contamination
in Puget Sound...

14
February 2001. As reported by Reuters
and ENN,
scientists have identified several factors that may be contribuing
to why girls in the United States and elsewhere appear to be reaching
puberty earlier in life. While there are as yet no certain answers,
evidence points to obesity, social factors and contamination
all playing potential roles. A complex pattern may emerge as
ongoing research continues, with there not be a single cause nor
a single trend, but instead patterns that vary geographically
and among different groups of people. In some, obesity may be
the driving force, in others contamination, and in still others,
social factors.

13
February 2001. The European Union is preparing to require that more
safety information be obtained about chemicals in the environment.
Without proof of the chemical's safety, they will be banned from
use. For substances thought to be particularly harmful, data
would have to be submitted within five years. Data for the entire
list of high volume chemicals (roughly 30,000 used in the EU) studies
would have to be complete by 2018.Reuters
story.

8
January 2001. Mice exposed at low levels to a combination of pesticides
develop symptoms behaviorally and anatomically very similar to
Parkinson's disease in humans. The pesticides involved are from
two different types: a herbicide, paraquat, and a fungicide, maneb.
Both these compounds are used on millions of acres of crops
such as potatoes, tomatoes, lettuce, corn, soybeans, cotton and
fruit.

Mice
exposed to low levels of either paraquat or maneb alone were unaffected,
but with repeated exposure they combined synergistically to
cause cell death in precisely the same pattern seen in Parkinson's
disease in people. In an interview
on Lycos ENN, the research team leader, Dr. Deborah Cory-Schlecta
of Rochester University, noted that "In the real world, we're
exposed to mixtures of chemicals every day. There are thousands
upon thousands of combinations. I think what we have found is
the tip of the iceberg."

3
January 2001. Based on the largest number of women with documented
exposure to diethylstilbestrol in the womb, a study published
in Obstetrics & Gynecology (October 2000) confirms that
women exposed to DES during development in the womb suffer, throughout
their reproductive life, from worse pregnancy outcomes than unexposed
counterparts. They are less likely to have had full-term live
births, as well as more likely to have premature births, spontaneous
pregnancy losses and ectopic pregnancies. More...

3
January 2001. According to the BBC scientists in Britain "are
calling for urgent research to be carried out into the safety
of farmed salmon after research showed that some fish contain
worrying levels of potentially dangerous chemicals." PCBs,
the chemicals discovered in the salmon, are thought to be coming
from fish harvested in open ocean trawling that is then ground into
pellets to manufacture salmon food. "Concentrating the
nutritional value of these fish into pellets to produce a high-protein
diet for farmed salmon multiplies the minute traces of toxins present
in each individual fish to a more significant level. " In otherwords,
fishing for salmon food has created a human variation on bioaccumulation
in the food chain, thereby contributing to human health risks. PCBs
have been implicated in a variety of human and wildlife health problems,
including neurodevelopmental
impairment, immune
system errors and cancer.
Go
to the BBC.

3
January. In an article published on 10 December, 2000, Richard Raeke
reports in the Anniston
Star on Superfund-level PCB contamination around Anniston,
Alabama, that remains 30 years after Monsanto first reported
leaks from its production facility. According to this newspaper
story, internal documents obtained during disclosure in a law suit
currently underway indicate that Monsanto misrepresented the
scope of the contamination, and that at times as many as 250 pounds
were leaking from the plant on a daily basis. A particularly revealing internal memo states: From
the Legal standpoint there is extreme reluctance to report even
the relatively low emission figures because the information could
be subpoenaed and used against us in legal actions. Obviously having
to report these gross losses multiplies, enormously, our problems
because the figures would appear to indicate a lack of control.